Tuesday, October 21, 2008

Feeding the Fire: Part 2

As I thought it might, the first part of this riled the Taplin bloggers. I was told that as a troll, I could only comment on cultural issues or leave.

I said no deal.

I'm disappointed. There are some there who's names I know from the music business and respected, but like John Lennon said, it's not always good to meet your heros.

Oh, I know this creature of yours... Vermithrax Pejorative. Look at these scales, these ridges. When a dragon gets this old, it knows nothing but pain, constant pain. It grows decrepit... crippled... pitiful. Spiteful!

In my past, these were the good guys, but like the dragon in Dragonslayer, with age comes only pain and that makes them spiteful. In all my years on the web and before, I've never encountered a group quite like that. The rage turns any claim they make for their candidate into a shrill scream for justification to hurt their enemies.

Driven by the news media, shows like The View and the speeches of the candidates, the rage is building. I don't know if it can be stopped. The left wing has traditionally been the peace party in this country. Now it is something unrecognizable, a twisted characature of itself spitting back obscenties and intimidating anyone who dares dissent.

I thought Bush was bad. He was just dumb. These are the intellectuals, the elite, the people America lavished its best in education and opportunity on howling at the moon like wolves in blood lust. They are even quoting Dave Winer as a supporter. Dave is familiar with the flame wars and what the RSS zealots did to him should be enough to make him understand a rage machine. I wonder if he approves.

The right is little better. All you have to do is read the blogs, follow the links and you see what this is about. McCain's campaign was pretty docile during the primaries. With the negative campaign and the left in their faces, they've surrendered to the madness too. Now we are in the eye for an eye part of the campaign and nothing good will come of this.

Are either of the candidates worth this? In my opinion, absolutely not.

My love for nonviolence is superior to every other thing mundane or supramundane. It is equaled only by my love for Truth, which is to me synonymous with nonviolence through which and which alone I can see and reach Truth.

....Without ahimsa it is not possible to seek and find Truth... Ahimsa is the means; Truth is the end. Means to be means must always be within our reach, and so ahimsa is our supreme duty. If we take care of the means, we are bound to reach the end sooner or latter. When once we have grasped this point, final victory is beyond question.

Ahimsa is not the goal. Truth is the goal. But we have no means of realizing truth in human relationships except through the practice of ahimsa. - M.K. Gandhi

Some are, John. I know one who is traveling with the man right now. So, yes, I understand the professional side of it and why the will to power is a career in the Beltway. The thing I don't say to the Obama people is that personally my fortunes are a lot better if he wins.

Taplin's blog has the famous people. The West Coasters are into it and that is somewhat like my conversation with Sharon in the hall at the XML conference. I come from a different culture. Having people insinuate I am racist, insult my art, that sort of thing, isn't casual banter and you know I am sharp tongued enough in writing to respond tit for tat. I really don't like it. It rots the soul.

What I can't understand is the deep seated hypocrisy that allows them to believe they can demonize someone without really admitting what has gone on in their man's campaign. You know I'm not a fan of the Bush years, but until the last two months, the McCain campaign was pretty middle of the road. It's a rage machine now too. So this whole thing is getting out of control.

Obama's cause on the surface is fine although it is flakey. I don't take it as seriously as his followers do and from what I hear, he knows a lot of what is talking about is unachievable. The money isn't there.

It may just be time for the other team. I hold them to a higher standard. Means really do matter because they limit what is believable after winning. Obama should be setting a much better example and so should McCain.

What gets my goat though is what is being done to Palin. She doesn't deserve that. No one does.